Good morning, jttmab. How are you today?
The US sold arms to Iran and Iraq at the same time.
I repeat, the US did not sell arms to Iran and Iraq at the same time. US arms manufacturers did, even though it was against the law, and when they were caught, they were prosecuted.
law.emory.edu
Trade with Iran has been illegal since the fall of the Shah. Remember when Clinton pardoned Marc Rich? Rich's crime was dealing with the Iranians. It is alleged that Rich paid for Iranian oil with small arms, automated weapons, and rocket launchers.
house.gov
If it happened so long ago, why does Bush bring it up.
I have not seen Bush bringing up the Iran-Iraq war. Maybe he does, but I'd need to see what he said so I could understand the context.
I know he brings up the Gulf War, which was fought 1991, but isn't really over yet. The US has assisted in a UN sponsored effort to force Saddam to get rid of WMD since then. This was started under Bush I, and continued under Clinton. Clinton bombed Baghdad in 1998, or maybe you don't remember that. Daschel sponsored a Senate resolution calling for the use of military force against Iraq in order to force compliance with the same UN resolutions that Bush is talking about now.
Here's what Daschel said in 1998: "'Look, we have exhausted virtually our diplomatic effort to get the Iraqis to comply with their own agreements and with international law. Given that, what other option is there but to force them to do so?' That's what they're [Clinton administration] saying. This is the key question. And the answer is we don't have another option. We have got to force them to comply, and we are doing so militarily."
Here's what Clinton said:
>>"Just consider the facts," Bill Clinton urged.
"Iraq repeatedly made false declarations about the weapons that it had left in its possession after the Gulf War. When UNSCOM would then uncover evidence that gave the lie to those declarations, Iraq would simply amend the reports. For example, Iraq revised its nuclear declarations four times within just 14 months and it has submitted six different biological warfare declarations, each of which has been rejected by UNSCOM. In 1995, Hussein Kamal, Saddam's son-in-law, and chief organizer of Iraq's weapons-of-mass-destruction program, defected to Jordan. He revealed that Iraq was continuing to conceal weapons and missiles and the capacity to build many more. Then and only then did Iraq admit to developing numbers of weapons in significant quantities and weapon stocks. Previously, it had vehemently denied the very thing it just simply admitted once Saddam Hussein's son-in-law defected to Jordan and told the truth."
Clinton was on a roll:
"Now listen to this: What did it admit? It admitted, among other things, an offensive biological warfare capability--notably 5,000 gallons of botulinum, which causes botulism; 2,000 gallons of anthrax; 25 biological-filled Scud warheads; and 157 aerial bombs. And might I say, UNSCOM inspectors believe that Iraq has actually greatly understated its production.
Next, throughout this entire process, Iraqi agents have undermined and undercut UNSCOM. They've harassed the inspectors, lied to them, disabled monitoring cameras, literally spirited evidence out of the back doors of suspect facilities as inspectors walked through the front door. And our people were there observing it and had the pictures to prove it. "
More Clinton: "We have to defend our future from these predators of the 21st century," he argued. "They will be all the more lethal if we allow them to build arsenals of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons and the missiles to deliver them. We simply cannot allow that to happen. There is no more clear example of this threat than Saddam Hussein." <<
weeklystandard.com
I made several points that you happened to totally ignore; including a direct question.
I'll pay attention to your "points" if you post credible links to back them up. You asked several questions, which one was it that you particularly wanted an answer to? |
